6 Bathroom and beyond.

And now we come to the present. I brushed my teeth vigorously in attempt to clean off the residue of puke my fireside episode had left. When that failed I turned to the mouthwash and gargled many gulps before I realized my mouth would never be clean enough. Not after what I did. I contemplated eating the soap but put it down before I took a bite.

"Helga, you can't hide in the bathroom forever. We have to talk about what happened." Ug. I pushed some cold water on my face for the fourth time and toweled it dry. I looked at my thick brows and wondered if I could thin them. I milled around the medicine cabinet for the tool I've seen Suzie Kikoshka use and started plucking a few hairs.

"OW! How does she do this everyday?" I asked myself. I put the tweezers back and looked at myself one last time. My eyes were still red, and my face was still blocky. My lips had regained their soft pink color, but that didn't really matter. My face had all the evidence Arnold wanted to know that I had not been good. Not like he needed it though. As soon he came home my former best friend told him everything. I wondered if I would do the same. It's hard to say.

"If you don't come out right now I'm coming in!" Arnold yelled.

"All right, all right. Don't be such a baby football head!" I opened the door and was met with his angry eyes. He tried to look at me sternly but soon his expression slacked into one of pure sadness. He relaxed his tie and let it hang off his collared shirt some.

"Well," I slurred, still drunk, "What do you want to talk about?" He sighed deeply, his eyes clamping shut.

"I can't believe you're asking that question. What else would I want to talk about!"

"I don't know. Peace in the Middle East? How the economy is still in the shitter? OO! Maybe you want to tell me something funny one of your patients did today? That's always good for a laugh." I don't know why I was making light of all this, but it seemed like the best thing to do.

"No Helga, I want to talk about how you shoved Phoebe to the ground, how you nearly burned her hand when she tried to call me, and why we are out of a full bottle of Bacardi rum!" My smiled faded.

"Oh…that."

"Yes, That!" He grabbed my hand and dragged me down the stairs to the fireplace. I tried to fight him off but my stance was wobbly at best so I had no other choice but to be led like a puppy. I saw Phoebe crying into the shoulders of Gerald when Arnold and I got back to the scene. Gerald gave me the death stare as he held on to his trembling wife.

"Come on, out with it!" Arnold ordered. I stood in the middle of the room and composed what I might say. But none of it seemed good enough. "Well!"

"My hands were shaking," I started, "and I just wanted them to stop. I wanted them to stop…" I could hear myself talking but it might as well have been someone else. My mind was disconnected, elsewhere in the world. It's like I was two people at once: the person trying desperately to save herself, and the woman who wanted it all to go away. It was hard to choose whom to be.

"That's it! That's your answer to all this! Shaking hands?" Arnold shouted as he looked at me. I looked back at him, not sure what else I could say. My head grew heavy with ache as I stumbled to the nearest chair. I slumped into it feeling weighed down by everything and everyone around me. I could hear Phoebe still crying on Gerald in the other side of the room. She hugged him close as she buried her head into his chest, giving off soft but audible weeps. They were just as present as the glow from the fire, and the mild heat that spread around the room. It was everywhere.

"You crossed a line Helga," Gerald said to me, his eyes stilled fixed in their mean stare. I gazed back, hoping my eyes could denote some sort of apology, though I knew I didn't mean it. I asked her to do one thing for me and she refused.

"Fuck, my head. When will the pain ever END!"

"When you choose it to," my husband said sternly. "You can make this all go away if you really wanted to, if you cared to!"

"Oh, don't you dare make this all about me ok? Don't you dare think for second that if you just listened to me and not pushed ahead this silly little dinner of yours I'd be sober right now? This all your fault Football head! If you had just let me be I could have done what I wanted at the proper time!"

"Oh really? This is my fault? The simple fact that you emptied a whole bottle of liquor was caused by what I did?" He sighed, closing his eyes again. "I'm so sorry you feel that way Helga. But you have to be big enough to realize that I didn't put your hand on that bottle. I didn't tell you go outside and smoke without a coat on in the dead of winter, and I sure as hell didn't tell you jump at your best friend! The only thing I did was try to make you face what you came from and realize that you could be better then that! But I guess I was wrong. Phoebe's crying sure proves that." He went to the mantel and put his hand on it, looking deep within the flames. He didn't say much, but I could tell through my fogged eyes that he was thinking about something. I wondered if he had enough of me. I hoped not.

Time became choppy as watched my husband. I drifted between a state of on and off. I wanted to get up, but lacked the strength. My body had gone limp from drunkenness.

"I don't understand it," Arnold sobbed lightly, "Why would you do this?" He watched the fire dance a little while longer before turning to me, his eyes drowning. I tried to make out the worried lines of his face but found it tough.

The more I sat, the harder it became to see the solid details of my world. I paned my head around me to find something I could look at clearly. The room once again boiled down into separate colors.

"I want to help you Helga. But I don't think I can."

"What are you saying?" I forced out, afraid of his answer. Arnold went to me and got down on one knee. He inched closer as he grabbed my hand, falling silent again. "Make it fast," I choked, "My head…" He let out a huge pocket of air and looked at the floor.

"I think you need to go away for a while."

"What?" I shot up. I looked my husband's eyes in panic.

"This is not good for you Helga. This is not good for us. Think of your son! Do you really want him to keep seeing you like this? Is this the message you want him to grow up with? That you can drink away your problems?" He cried harder as he spoke, his voice getting horse with emotion. I turned my now throbbing head away from Arnold. I clamped my sore eyes shut, the lights hitting me like steak knives. I didn't know what to say. By now Phoebe had stopped crying, settling into watching my husband and me with Gerald.

"Is that how you feel about me now," I said softly, "Am I so horrible that you have to cast me off like some piece of trash?"

"If you keep acting like this then I may have no other choice. I love you Helga. I really do. But my love can only do so much." He sighed deeply as he stroked my cheek. I could hear him desperately trying not cry any harder, gulping down his tears. He then stood up, slightly shaking. "I can't do this. I can't look at you when you're like that. I'm going to check on little Phil. Please…don't do anything else." I saw him walk away unhurriedly, taking the time to look me over. And that's when I finally passed out.